My bad for misinterpreting the conversation.
I would agree with that.
I believe the crux of Sibelios’s apprehension is that he is expecting the game to be balanced closer to that of a single player game and the publisher likely has very different intentions in mind, which is further feeding back into his apprehension towards the matter.
I try (but occasionally fail) to not believe things about the expectations of others. Any mind reading attempts I have made in the past, have usually ended badly. 
Written communication is easily misconstrued. A misplaced comma can change the meaning of a sentence, and all that. But, I still find that I have better luck not trying to read between the lines. Your mileage may vary, of course.
As to the issue on the table… I personally intend to let the devs sort it out. Then I will give my feedback. That’s why we are here. 
Ok, @Lyrian, let’s go.
You could not be more off the mark. I’ve played numerous F2P model games that have various incentive structures, lockouts, daily gating, resource constraints, etc. etc. I literally authored a thread regarding the Shop structure, it’s necessary place in the the game’s F2P model and the need to have a functional purchase economy that properly incents players to occasionally spend money. You even posted to the thread! So spare me this drivel about my apprehensions that this game will not be the premium game of my dreams 
Also, why are you even still here in this thread? Didn’t this stink of moldy cheese. Weren’t you desperate to get away? What were your thoughts again?
Oh that’s right, you just couldn’t resist opining with your expert opinion about how the game is going to go. The whole point of my mostly rhetorical questions earlier was to emphasize that during early access things are always subject to significant changes and developers can change their minds about the direction of gameplay as they get more input (which includes feedback from players). I get that you are a beta tester for Gems of War and you think you have some special insights into the direction of development for PQ3, but mostly you just show up and throw cold water on people’s ideas about how elements of the game can be changed or improved. Why you feel the need to constantly dev-splain to everyone how the game will manifest is beyond me as you have shown regularly that you don’t know any more than us.
For instance, here you are explaining to us based on your insider knowledge how Relics are not yet available at any reasonable drop rates under the new evolution framework introduced in 0.35:
Later on you could see people continuing to be confused about this “half-implementation” that was clearly explained in the patch notes so you chimed in again with this dev-splanation:
Hmm. Ok so maybe those patch notes were not so clear after all!
What about addressing issues with the state of the game, critiquing drops or drop rates based on on the investment of time by players:
Here is @Lyrian exhorting the development team to review their drop rates and reconsider the quantities because in his view players are entitled to better rewards from higher value chests; not just more rewards but better rewards. The hubris!
What about abysmally low drop rates that make the player feel like they can’t accomplish objectives in the game; that makes it feel like they are just putting time into getting paltry rewards and might discourage them from playing?
What about when an issue has been acknowledged by the developer, but there is concern that their plan might not be sufficient to resolve the matter:
I wonder what @Lyrian has to say to all these suggestions that the developer review their drop rates, rethink incentives to players, and continue to take input even when the developer has made acknowledgements that the issue will be addressed in the future:
Harsh!
I’m sure some will think I’m a jerk or that I’m playing some stupid game of “Gotcha”. I’m sure @Lyrian will point out how all his observations were valid and worthwhile while mine were petty and already fully addressed. The reality is, @Lyrian is not the developer of this game no more than I am. @Lyrian has ideas and suggestions and recommendations about what would make the game better from his perspective. Ok. But I and others also have ideas, and suggestions and recommendations about what would make the game better from our perspectives. We don’t need @Lyrian to constantly tell us that our ideas won’t work or can’t continue to be discussed because that’s not how the development cookie crumbles. We don’t need him to step in and address all our concerns with his “Developer Translation Services”.
Whatever, I’m sick of it and going forward I will do my best to ignore @Lyrian’s attempts to dev-annotate mine and everyone else’s inputs.
In my view, adding increased drop rates for Relics will not upset the F2P model or the “drip” economy that they want to implement in their event system. If anything it will provide additional motivation for players to continue to play the game even when their dailies are done. It will also allow players to feel like they have a bit more direction and control on what they want to focus on in the game. And who knows, perhaps the additional dungeon runs will yield the 3rd Relic they need, while the 4th Relic is waiting in the shop to be snatched up (but the player was disinclined to make the purchase when it was the 3rd Relic needed). This can be done simultaneously with any other “drip” model and I would argue is worth doing to create an overall cycle of player engagement.
There are so many things to still address in this game; so many interlocking elements that may be incompatible now but ultimately work perfectly well for all parties. I would hope that more and more players are offering suggestions based on their experience playing numerous games, not just Gems of War. And in my opinion it’s good for players to advocate for changes even if it seems unlikely that the developer/publisher sees any value in it. I’ve participated in enough betas/early accesses over the years to know that ideas emerge from players all the time, many which were originally resisted by developers but ultimately were seen as advantageous to player engagement and were inevitably embraced. I want to continue to advocate for such changes.
(Apologies to anyone that read through this entire thing. As my personal mind-reader @Lyrian once said:)
Please keep this thread on topic.
If the meat of your post isn’t about the thread topic, please move it to PM or find another place for it.
I am locking this thread for a few days to give everyone time to cool off. It will open again next week.
This topic was automatically opened after 2 days.
The flood gates are open again. XD
My issue has always been more so with the glyphs than the relics/flux. The low relic amount in chests definitely need adjusting, and hopefully the new thing in 0.36 makes obtaining relics barrable, but changes made in 0.35 essentially dashes any chances of making a level 50 anything.
0.35 changed the glyphs needed to max a weapon from legend to level 50 mythic from 4 to 14 (4 to ascend then 2 per level).
For that cost to be viable, 0.36 would have to essentially drop a glyph every single day, as assuming all 5 are weighted evenly it would take 70 days for 1 max mythic anything at a rate of about 1 glyph per day. The problem is I have a feeling the glyph rate will be waaaay less than 1 per day.
Lets say it gives 1 glyph per week (which there is a chance it wouldn’t even do that). Assuming all 5 are weighted evenly (which based on shop prices they probably aren’t), it would come out to 490 DAYS for 1 maxed mythic if 0.36 gives an average of 1 glyph per week.
Of course it will be.
Look at the changes that were made in 0.35 as the partial implementation of the Relic system.
The VIP Pass yields 2 Armor Relics for every 100 paid days of VIP status.
The Campaign Pass yields 2 random typed Relics as a Tier 29 prize. 1 random Mythic Relic is rewarded as the Tier 30 prize.
Evolving things to Legendary and Mythic is going to be a glacially slow process by design.
My stab in the dark is that it will be 1 random glyph per Event duration (which we don’t know what that is yet) at the max guild prize tier. It may be weekly, like GoW, or it may be longer in PQ3.
To me, Mythic gear is going to be the equivalent of Level 20 kingdoms in GoW. It’s going to be a very long-term goal.
The changes drew definitive lines in the sand for the expectations towards gear leveling.
The soft cap on gear is at Epic 35 for casual players who won’t ever chase Glyphs.
Mid-tier players will collect a moderate stream of Glyphs over time, sufficient to pay the two Glyph toll to reach Legendary 45.
Invested players may save up Glyphs and choose to upgrade key or favorite pieces over time to Mythic 45. The cost is very high, but the doubling of desirable Attributes from +4 to +8 with Mythic ascension can be worth it… on the right pieces.
Beyond that, only the most hardcore players with very deep pockets should ever even think about leveling past Mythic 45. The return on each level past 45 is so incredibly poor, that the only possible reason to do so might be if there is some competitive event (like Guild Wars in GoW) where every single stat point matters and someone wants to be that person just to be on top of that competitive leaderboard. The only possible valid edge case would be for a player’s first 50 weapon. But even then, the marginal damage upgrades are never worth it. That said, going from 299 damage at Mythic 45 to 332 damage at Mythic 50 is too small to significantly matter.
The game’s power creep model is going to be through the release of future Chapters and new sets of Gear and Spells. That is going to further discourage long-term investing in a single set of gear, unless the synergy of collected pieces is that good. Even then, the devs are surely going to create gear combinations that are going to encourage players to chase whatever the shininess of whatever the meta will become when new gear and spells sets are released. And the cycle will repeat anew, over and over.
Quick Update: I have now completed 1000 dungeon runs post 0.35 (~85% between 70-75, the rest level 100), opening every chest but wooden along the way (either through keys or minions), although i might have salvaged a few iron chests if I’m honest. For my efforts I have 1x Iron Nails. So assuming that Relics only appear in Gold+ chests (which means your chance of even having an eligible chest from a dungeon run are 31%), my “calculated” drop rate from eligible chests is about 0.3%, from all chests (i.e. Dungeon completion) is about 0.1%. Small chance indeed!
Here’s hoping there’s no regrets with this statement 
Or what? You’ll get angry? Or worse?
It’s one thing to be highly passionate about a topic. It’s totally another thing to imply a threat to the devs about said topic. The emoji in your post does not help matters here, either.
Your post is is an example of why Salty and the other devs have an standard operating policy of not providing broad timetables about when updates are planned to be released to the community. You’re burning the goodwill bridge that Salty built with the post you are quoting to the ground for the PQ3 community.
Please don’t salt the earth here before the game is even formally released.
Wow. I call attention to something you yourself acknowledge is a practice they tend to avoid (this has been said repeatedly), so I think it’s fair to bring attention to the comment and state the obvious; the fact that there was a timetable given is something that I’m sure they hope they can meet or yet again they will regret making such a statement. The fact that you come on here and imply that I’m making threats is just once again evidence of your wish to make me out to be some sort of menace.
Thanks for trying though.
P.S. @Salty - Feel free to address this issue and the apparent threats that @Lyrian has tried to imply that I am making. I’m really tired of this personal campaign that he is waging against me for simply calling out a statement that you yourself have said that you don’t like making. There is nothing sinister about calling attention to the communications shared on this forum. You chose to make it. I am simply reminding people that it was made. It’s called accountability, not threats.
Do you not understand what you are doing?
Leaving out the “or else…” part of the a threat does not make it any less of a threat. You, nor me, nor any normal user on this forum has the power to hold Salty or any of the devs “accountable” for anything.
I completely cannot comprehend what explicit or implicit authority you could possibly have over the development team to make such statements to be able to enforce accountability over them.
At this point, I’m petitioning @Salty , @Cyrup , or @Jeto to perma-lock this thread. There’s literally zero productive value this thread could possibly have anymore.
The authority I have is that of user of a product that the makers’ of said product want me and others to continue using. If the makers of a product continually overpromise and underdeliver, the player base can choose to stop accepting what they say as being reliable and choose to migrate to a different product. I am not beholden to you about continuing to hold product makers accountable for their statements. The fact that you view this relationship as one of compulsory fandom is your choice.
Also, you literally have an entire community of players who have been repeating this time frame given here in game chat for weeks now. Do you think that there will not be repercussions in terms of player reaction if they don’t deliver the update? Stop trying to trap me into some sort of “gotcha” threat to make yourself out to be some sort of forum hero and look at what the actual playerbase is saying.
Finally, the main thrust of this thread has been for my part about the paucity of drop rates of Relics/Glyphs and the misleading information that was disseminated about introduction/changes to these items per the patch notes. It’s been acknowledged since that the “sytem” that was introduced was a partial implementation that left core elements of the game essentially unplayable and that communication about this was poor. Furthermore, it has been two months in which the game has remained in this state. Within this thread a communication about this issue and the timeline was brought up by the Community Manager.
YOU @Lyrian have been the individual on this thread who has made it personal, unproductive, and quite frankly acrimonious. Every time I do my best to continually respond to your implications with facts and you continue to make insinuations like you have some sort of school yard grudge.
I think these folks are lucky that you are not an actual community manager given your behavior. But should you prevail, I guess it would be because of some relationship you have with the community personnel since nothing here would merit it other than your consistent efforts to create a fire where there is none.
Yes, everyone is hungry for some sort of major update to arrive. That is indisputable.
To pass judgment on an early access game that everyone knows is incomplete? That’s unreasonable.
In last week’s mini-update, Salty stated that part of 0.36 was going to include a dungeon rework, which was not previously mentioned to be in the update. This was something that you, personally, have been championing in this very thread since it’s beginning. Would you rather them potentially rush out this update and possibly screw up the dungeon rework just because they had to commit to some vague statement Salty made multiple weeks ago?
And what would happen if exactly that just happened? Would you make another thread demanding accountability from the devs because the rework was rushed/wasn’t ready to make an arbitrary timetable?
The active daily player base has gone down by over 50% the last month, almost entirely because of changes in version 0.35.
Some portion of them will never be back.
It was one of the most dysfunctional patches I have ever seen in any game. It essentially removed (at least temporarily) multiple systems from the game for nearly 2 months.
Some of these include the entirely of the ascending system, any reasonable use for food aside from in guild wars for the only limited resource they can be used on each day, any reasonable use for gold since things prior that sunk gold are nonexistent in 0.35, any way to reasonably get progress towards upgrading followers as the current time to max in this patch is longer than the system they had prior (was 2 years before and is 3 years in the current state of 0.35), a mana bug that makes anyone with a % mana start that doesn’t have a bone ring essentially be stuck in a near unplayable state, among a few other detrimental things that have been unchecked for 2 months.
There is also a concern that 0.36 will address very little of the issues, or leave many of the issues in the game for yet another 2+ months.
On the topic itself of relics, I likely have one of the biggest top 10 resource piles in the entire game, yet am still at only 25% of the way to ascending 1 item in 2 months. Prior to the patch, it was around 1 per week, normally a rare to epic, but sometimes uncommon to rare.
I guess it’s better that you are insinuating about my future postings instead of insinuating that I’m making threats. I’m not into reading tea leaves. For myself, I will continue to evaluate game content that actually exists and provide comment about such rather than constantly make assumptions about what someone else is thinking, saying, or will do in the future. Given that broad statements are made all the time about upcoming content, I have no view as to what I’m going to say about something about which virtually no information is currently available.
Perhaps. Some of these things have already been said to be fixed with the update. Others, are yet to be seen.
0.36 very well may completely rewrite a whole bunch of core game mechanics again. I wouldn’t be surprised if at some point the game adopts GoW’s starting mana mechanic (only the single strongest source applies) to address Turn 0 PvP wins and Turn 1 PvE looping. I severely doubt the devs are going to allow events to be cheesed in the same way level 100 dungeons currently are.
The devs have been doing more prep work behind the scenes for the upcoming update. There was a stealth server push on Friday that made some significant changes to other systems in the game that were not dungeon related. Kind of surprised that no one made a thread commenting on the changes. Personally very curious about the “other shoe to fall” regarding these changes when the update lands.